Wine grape production and prices expected to increase

24 July 2013

Editorial

The Southern Hemisphere’s wine grape production along with wine grape prices have strengthened to represent significant increases on last year’s harvest.

Rabobank’s Wine Quarterly report states that the 2013 Australian wine harvest is estimated at 1.83m tonnes, up 10 percent on last year, with New Zealand, Chile and South Africa also expected to harvest record crops.

Prices in cooler wine regions rose by an impressive 13.1 percent while prices in warmer climates rose modestly to 3.5 percent the Weekly Times Now reports.

Despite harsh conditions at the beginning of the year including extended heat waves, Rabobank’s senior analyst, Marc Soccio said that heat had little effect on crops located in hot inland regions as they produced up to 60 percent of what is said to be the largest crop in five seasons.

Australian wine exports experienced a decline of 5.8 percent in volume, and 1.7 percent in value for the first quarter of the year when compared to the previous year’s results.

Average export unit values to China and Hong Kong reached AUD$8 per litre with other ASEAN markets reaching AUD$7.78 per litre.